Crispy Pork Bibimbap

Are you on the bibimbap bandwagon yet? Husband and I have been for awhile now. Yet somehow, the bowl you see above is consistently still our favorite dinner. Don’t believe me? Scan my Instagram and count the number of times you see this bowl. It will be several.

Bibimbap is a Korean dish that usually consists of rice, a variety of veggies, meat, a fried egg, and hot sauce. But hey, the nice thing about making it yourself is you can add or subtract whatever you d*mn well please.

For husband and I, the key to making this dish so special is the crispy pork. Yes, you can make bibimbap with a variety of meats – beef is pretty common and I’ve even had it with smoked chicken (thank you Kim Jong Smokehouse) but … we really, really love this crispy pork.

Full disclosure – this is a time consuming dish to make. It’s not hard, but set aside a decent amount of time or better yet, prepare some of your ingredients in advance. Before we dive into the nitty gritty, here’s a little video to give you the idea:

You can do the pork in your slow cooker or Instant Pot – it is equally wonderful either way. Use good salt – either smoked sea salt or pink Himalayan salt, plenty of garlic, and PORK SHOULDER/BUTT, not any other cut of pork. Got it? Got it. Then you’re going to cook it for a really long time. 10-12 hours in the slow cooker, 90 minutes in the Instant Pot. Once it’s done, shred it up, throw it in a cast iron skillet over medium high heat, and let it cook in it’s own fat to get nice and crispy.

For the veggies, I really like to get a predone slaw from the store, like a broccoli slaw, baby bok choy if they have it, and kale if they don’t. Secret pro tip: if you do kale or other hearty greens, cook them in the liquid from the pork. It is IMPOSSIBLE to complain about kale if it’s done this way. Just lightly cook your veggies in a little sesame oil and rice vinegar and throw in some gochujang if you have it.

Put all of that on top of rice, add PLENTY of Kimchi (we are big fans of Choi’s Kimchi), fry an egg and make sure you keep that yolk nice and runny, then add a generous amount of sriracha and if you’re feeling fancy green onions and sesame seeds. You can either mix it all up or keep it separate and design your bites one at a time.

Cut pork into ½ pound (ish) chunks. Season liberally with salt. Cut slits into the meat and insert the garlic cloves into the slits.

If using a slow cooker, add pork to the slow cooker and cook on low for 10-12 hours. If using an Instant Pot, add ½ cup water to the Instant Pot followed by the pork. Cook on the manual setting for 90 minutes. Once finished, use the quick release.

While the pork is cooking, assemble the veggies. Add a third of the sesame oil and rice vinegar to a nonstick skillet. Add the baby bok choy and cook for 4-5 minutes, until softened. Set aside. Repeat with broccoli slaw and red cabbage.

Remove pork from slow cooker or Instant Pot and place on a cutting board. Shred with two forks. Heat a cast iron skillet over medium-high heat and add the shredded pork. Let cook without touching it for 2 minutes to let the bottom get crispy. Stir the pork and repeat until it's mostly crispy.

Start assembling the bowls. Rice on the bottom, pork and veggies on top. You won't use all the pork (leftovers!).

Melt the butter in the skillet you cooked the veggies in. Fry the eggs in the butter and season with salt and pepper. Keep the yolks runny.

Top bowls with the eggs. Garnish with sriracha, green onions, and sesame seeds.

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I'm Chelsea and I’m a 20-something graduate of the University of Oregon currently in Portland, OR. I first started this blog as a college student hoping to encourage other students to branch outside of pizza and boxed mac and cheese. While some things have changed since I finished school, I still rely on simple recipes to produce fun, comforting food!

I like to think of myself as adventurous with my cooking, but my style is usually simple. You just gotta get dinner on the table.